The Whispering Land
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The Whispering Land is an autobiographical account of the 8 months Gerald Durrell spent travelling in Argentina during the late 1950's, collecting animals for his then recently founded Jersey Zoo. The book is divided into 2 parts; In the first, Durrell travels south from Buenos Aires to the arid scrublands of Patagonia and in the second he is based at a small town in the north western province of Jujuy.
In the first part he travels south with his (then) wife Jacquie Durrell and 2 other female companions to the town of Puerto Desedao in the Santa Cruz province; from here they travel to the outskirts of a remote local ranch where they then spend a time filming penguins. After this they then move north to Peninsula Valdes where they spend several weeks filming a South American fur seal colony as well as southern elephant seals. Other animals observed on the peninsula include Guanacos
In the second part, his wife Jacquie having fallen ill and returned to England, Durrell travels alone to the tropical province of jujuy where he stays on a ranch with a couple, making friends with other locals who help him with his collecting work. He collects animals by purchasing pets from locals in the town he is based near initially, including a Red fronted Tucuman amazon named Blanco, yellow fronted amazon parrots, Grey necked Guans an Armadillo and a Geofferys cat kitten. Later travels to a larger nearby town yield up, amongst other things an Ocelot and a Yellow naped macaw. Durrell gets the chance to travel into some nearby forested mountains for 3 days before returning to Buenos Aires with his collection and has a bit of an ordeal trying to catch some Vampire bats but succeeds in procuring a pygmy owl.
The book ends as he farewells friends and leaves Argentina with his collection of animals to return to the Channel Islands via ship.
